Control Premium
by Urotnik
Summary: Petty gangster Oswald Cobblepot finds himself in a struggle for control between two mobs. As the Penguin juggles between the different aspects of his nature, he finds that the price of success in Gotham is often not only high, but potentially deadly.
1. Takeover 1

Control Premium

* * *

General disclaimer: All distinctive characters and related elements featured in this publication are trademarks of DC Comics. I claim no rights or profits.  
The text of the publication is intellectual property of myself, Lana Dragičević. Not to be used, altered or distributed without my expressed, written consent.

Notes: All the chapters are named for business terms, because I thought it suited a Penguin-focused tale.

Control premium is the amount an investor will pay in order to acquire control over a company. A takeover is the purchase of one company by another.

This story shows a period in Gotham before the Batman, when organised crime was florishing. Some of the characters' personal history details may be told a little differently from the comics, due to the fact that I haven't read their origin story.

**

* * *

**

Chapter One: Takeover

The elderly woman shuffled across the room in her slippers, her hands picking tresses of her greying hair into a makeshift bun. She glanced at her son, who was sitting at the kitchen table and reading the newspapers.

'I need you bring me flour today when you get back', she told him matter-of-factly.

'Yes, Mother', he replied dully and continued to read.

'And two lemons. Some sugar, too, we're nearly out.'

'Yes, Mother.'

'I have a busy schedule today, it's Friday, you know how it is.'

'Yes, Mothe − How _what_ is?' He looked up from his papers, a faint frown on his round face. 'Wait a moment... What are you planning on doing?'

She looked down at him as though she thought he had gone mad.

'It's _Friday_, Oswald. We always have sponge cake on Friday. You know Chester loves it, so I make it.'

Oswald Cobblepot swallowed painfully. He had long ago gotten used to the fact that his mother was going senile, in addition to her already vaguely confused mental state. It still hurt, though, when she said things like this.

'Mother?' he said tentatively, as she went to wash his empty coffee cup.

'Yes, Oswald?'

'You _do_ know Father has been dead for the last twenty years?'

Again that look from her, as if he was an idiot on top of his short stature and deformed hands. Oswald had grown to passionately hate that look.

'Now why would you say such a thing? I'm really shocked, Oswald. You know I dislike your odd sense of humour. Sometimes I think you're not quite right, I swear I do.'

Oswald's nostrils flared.

_Horrible, commandeering woman_, he thought. _Do you even know that I only moved back here because I'm afraid to leave you alone, in case you hurt yourself unwittingly? Of course you don't. You only know how to bully and bother and nag._

She continued to wash the same cup, over and over again. Oswald suddenly felt pity overwhelm him.

'I'm going now', he told her gently.

'Have a good day at school, Oswald', she said.

'_Work_. I am twenty six. I go to work. I'll bring Mrs Beckerly over, from next door.'

'Why is that woman always here? She just bosses and bullies me around!'

'About time someone did...' muttered Oswald to himself and took his coat from the stand.

He in fact happened to pay Mrs Beckerly to take care of his mother while he was away. Her condition was getting worse every day.  
He would have to find her a good retirement home soon, when her state made her completely unfit for living here. Still, as long as she managed, he preferred to keep her at home, where she had lived all her life.

'Did you clean the pet shop out yesterday? There's dust bunnies in the corners.'

'We sold the shop. Remember?'

'Oh, yes. Yes. Can't think of why, though. It was going so well.'

Until the break-in, Oswald recalled. It was all done purely out of malice, to thoughtlessly hurt them. He even knew the local idiots who'd done it - but that had never been proven. They'd gotten away with it, just as everyone else who had ever hurt him.

'Goodbye, Mother. Rest yourself. I'll be back this evening.'

_He'd never seen so many dead animals._

They had killed everything, even his beloved parrots. The loss wasn't just that they were the most valuable creatures in the shop – those birds had become his greatest companions over the years. He'd put their little broken bodies away very carefully; had spent the entire day sobbing and helplessly wiping blood off the floor and walls.

They'd sold the shop. It was impossible to afford starting all over again.

Oswald had thankfully learnt a lesson from it. The world trampled all over you mercilessly. There was no point in trying to be fair, struggling to maintain an honest existence.

'Take an umbrella, Oswald. It could rain later.'

He had already reached out to take it. He tried to stop himself, even though he'd feel somehow wrong without it. Stupid way of thinking, but she had always fretted when he didn't take it and, eventually, it had become a habit impossible to shake off.

'It's very sunny outside', he said mildly.

'But you know how it goes, unpredictable spring showers and so on.'

'It's _autumn_, Mother... But if you insist, I'll take it with me.'

He left her muttering about how the days flew by and knocked on the neighbour's door before going downstairs. Without old Mrs Beckerly, he didn't know how he'd manage.  
She was the one who had called him two months ago, when she'd spotted poor Mrs Cobblepot standing outside in the middle of the night, holding an umbrella as if waiting for her deceased husband to arrive. Mother had never gotten over his untimely death from pneumonia; the downpour that had proved his undoing still haunted her.

Oswald crossed the street, airily passing by another young man from the area, one he knew to be a petty gang member these days. He also recognised him as one of his childhood tormentors, but oddly enough, the bully wasn't laughing at him now.

No calls of 'Oswald the Penguin' greeted him; no pieces of garbage were thrown at him any more. The unpleasant individual merely nodded and went around a corner, to furtively watch him leave.

Oswald breathed the fresh afternoon air with self-satisfaction.  
Perhaps this change of behaviour towards him was not as strange as it seemed. Everyone in the underground these days knew who Oswald worked for.

***

Passing a large building site, walking beneath a new metal arch for the increasingly popular monorail system, Oswald entered a nondescript building at the edge of the city. He climbed the stairs and rang the doorbell to an ordinary apartment.

A pretty young woman opened it, narrowing her eyes at the sight of Oswald. The small man ignored her. He was used to getting looks like this from the ill-mannered secretary. She let him in and resumed her position at a desk, where she continued to apply red lacquer to her nails. Oswald shot her a look of utter disdain and went into his own makeshift office within the apartment.

Arnold, the bookkeeper, was already there, writing something down and listening to the radio. Oswald greeted him with a small smile and sat down at his desk, shifting aside neat stacks of paper. The room was full of crates of goods which had, ah, fallen off the backs of trucks; falsified paperwork filled any remaining flat surfaces. In the middle, a small emptied area held enough space for two desks, two typewriters and two busy workers.

This was the place where crime boss Albie Wesker employed them to calculate his various profits and do some _very_ creative accounting when it came to paying his taxes. Oswald created reports from the financial transactions diligently recorded by Arnold.

'How was your weekend?' Arnold quavered in his reedy voice.

'I...' said Oswald. Nothing much had happened, really. He picked up a file and proceeded to analyse the papers within.

'How was yours?' he asked Arnold kindly.

'V-very nice. I bought a new record and listened to that. I can c-capture the voice quite nicely now.'

Oswald nodded. He liked Arnold. The weak little man was some years older than him and already balding. He looked at the world worriedly through large round glasses, his demeanour always faintly apologetic.

Truly, to look at him, one would never have said that this was Arnold Wesker, nephew to Albie 'the Ferret' Wesker.

On the other hand, being a member to such a family of gangsters was what had made Arnold the way he was. When Oswald had first taken up his job within the mob, he had been warned of Awkward Arnold, the youngest son of Albie's late brother.  
The poor wretch had apparently been present as a child when his father and elder brothers, erstwhile heads of the family, had been murdered in a gunfire. He'd never been quite the same. His uncle had taken up the leading position, leaving his distraught nephew to lask behind at the rear of the hierarchy.

After meeting the mild-tempered man face to face, Oswald had been uncertain as to why everyone considered him dangerous.  
Arnold, who rarely spoke out of turn and often stuttered, unless he was singing or imitating a famous voice. Arnold, who always wished to be helpful, and who collected old records, theatre dolls and toy trains, and many other harmless objects.

That had been until he met Mr Scarface.


	2. Takeover 2

Control Premium

* * *

General disclaimer: All distinctive characters and related elements featured in this publication are trademarks of DC Comics. I claim no rights or profits.  
The text of the publication is intellectual property of myself, Lana Dragičević. Not to be used, altered or distributed without my expressed, written consent.

Notes: The Arnold Wesker in this story is a pre-Ventriloquist one, though his personality is already divided.

To Trumpeteer34: I hope you'll find this story to your taste, I'm glad you like the characterisations so far. I have a soft spot for poor Arnold, too.

To AZ-woodbomb: Thanks for reading, it's lovely to see interest in a Penguin story! I like him because his character can fit into every crowd, be it Arkham, mobster or ordinary citizen. I agree, both of the characters are dangerous individuals.

* * *

**Chapter One: Takeover (Part Two)**

'I c-can imitate Frankie Delaney's voice n-now, too. I didn't know whether I would be able to, until I bought the r-record', said Arnold proudly later that day.

'That's nice. I myself am useless at singing', said Oswald. He wondered briefly if he dared ask his voice-talented colleague about his other hobby and plunged on recklessly, after a moment's hesitation.

'You... You still practise ventriloquism, Arnie?'

'Oh, yes! It's quite easy n-now, too. I can throw my voice here...

Or here...

Or anywhere, really.'

'Ack!' exclaimed Oswald, resisting the urge to spin around as the voice seemed to come from right behind him.

'Remarkable! You are getting frighteningly good, my friend', he told Arnold. As he shifted the numbers of three sets of bills to appear more acceptable and above all _legal_, a deeper, more confident voice answered him.

'_Good? _This twerp 'ere spent the entire weekend practisin' his little _auditive games_. In case youse fellas haven't noticed, the Wesker gang ain't exactly blooming these days. What we _should_ of been doin' was gettin' even with them bastards at Goode's gang.'

'Hello, Mr Scarface', said Oswald resignedly.

Arnold Wesker had emotionally broken after the death of his family. He had broken into two, in fact.

Arnie was the small, meek, traumatised part of him which wanted only to be left in peace. Mr Scarface had surfaced some time after Arnold the hobbyist ventriloquist purchased an old doll resembling a twenties' gangster. Something had clicked in Arnold's emotionally strained brain. This new personality seemed to function parallel to Arnold, developing its own straight-forward, slick-speaking and sometimes ruthless personality.

Oswald felt that it helped to think of them as two individual persons in one body, rather than a very unfortunate split personality. It made things easier.

'What would _you_ have done this Saturday, Mr Scarface? Taken a gun to them all by yourself?' he asked with explicit doubt in his tone.

'Huh. Wouldn't have needed to be by myself, if that weasel-faced uncle of ours showed some guts. Woulda loved to give wonnerful Mr Goode a taste of steel.'

'Oh no!' whimpered Arnold in protest. 'That would be murder, Mr Scarface!'

'And your point is, Dummy? Just so's you know, that filthy scumbag's been getting his fingers over what was supposed to have been our dough!'

'Don't insult Arnold, Mr Scarface', chided Oswald.

The perky gangster was always bullying the shy bookkeeper. Sometimes he even hit him; or rather, to the rest of the world, it appeared that Arnold was repeatedly slapping himself.  
It was sad to watch. Oh, yes, indeed.

_And you thought your life was hard_, thought Oswald, looking down at his misshapen fingers.

'Eh, you keep your beak outta this, Penguin. The guy needs to get a grip on reality.'

'That was a very mean thing to say, Mr Scarface, sir.'

'Oh? Oh? Well, _excuse me_, I didn' know we was supposed to be _nice_ in this business! Makes you wonder where this operation's goin', if everyone's so nice an' cuddly an' tippy-toe considerate.'

'Sorry, Mr Scarface. Best if I keep quiet.'

Oswald stiffened. It was with great difficulty that he held his temper, reminding himself that Arnold was a very ill man and couldn't be held responsible for his actions, even if they were flagrant insults.

'Please refrain from calling me _that_. My name happens to be Oswald.'

'Yeah, sure, sure, buddy. What d'you think of tonight's enterprise? I hear you'll be goin', too.'

'So will you. Or rather, Arnold. I don't think it would be wise to make your debut appearance at the meeting with Goode. He must be handled with delicacy and tact.'

'So youse two sayin' I ain't got _tact_?'

Oswald rolled his eyes and returned to work, ignoring the continuing struggle between Arnold's polar personalities. After a while, the room went quite again and Oswald decided that it was safe to assume Arnold was in possession again.  
He spared a glance. The thin man was breathing heavily, running a trembling hand over his face.  
They worked in silence for the next two hours, Oswald double-checking all the receipts and documents they would be bringing to the meeting tonight.

***

'C-could I borrow your newspaper, please, Oswald? I haven't had a ch-chance to read it today.'

'Myself neither. I only got to the fifth page', hissed Oswald, still feeling disgruntled at his friend.

He managed to add: 'Of course you may take it. It's nearing coffee-break, in any case. I shall just finish this up.'

'Thank you, Oswald!'

'Not a problem, my dear fellow, not a problem.'

It was hard to stay angry at poor Arnold. Instead, the individual bearing an unfortunate resemblance to a pudgy penguin stayed focused on the work at hand.

He completed his overview of the mob's recent dealings and selected a dozen choice receipts for valuable merchandise, some of which would pass hands tonight in order to ensure the not-so-good Mr Goode's goodwill.

'So many _bad_ things happening in Gotham', stated Arnold sadly.

'What makes you say that?' asked Oswald, tucking a report on several 'acquired' second-hand cars back into the filing system.

'Did you take a look at the n-newsp-papers? There's been another murder in the Frattellini gang. The police have been called to break the s-strike at the s-steel factory, they injured fifteen workers. Broke a man's skull, it says here. Awful! And on top of it all, they're still s-searching for little Selina.'

'Who is she?'

'She's one of the girls that went missing from the orphanage at S-Scalby Street. You remember, don't you?'

'Oh, that. Yes, I remember', sighed Oswald. He didn't really like to think about the case; missing children fell into the category of subjects he could not do anything to help and thought best to avoid fretting about.  
He held up his calculator pensively and frowned. The numbers didn't seem to add up properly. Again.

'Seems now they found something out about the p-principal's illegal dealings and scarpered when he confronted them. Police didn't know about it until yesterday, when they f-f-found the first girl and questioned her.'

'I doubt they'll have enough substantial evidence to arrest the principal. They never do. That girl will have a pretty time at the orphanage now', grumbled Oswald.

'She won't be going to the orphanage, she'll be sent to a reformatory. You see, she admitted they were stealing petty objects from the man's office when they found him out.'

Arnold sighed in satisfaction at having completed a few long sentences without stuttering. Oswald slammed the calculator a few times onto the desk and got it working properly. He completed the sum and put the final receipt away.

'Hah! Out of the frying pan and into the fire. Well, that happens when you are not cautious enough. Let me see the papers now.'

'I suppose there's some good in everything – at least she's safe now and off the streets.'

Arnold came and handed Oswald the Gotham Gazette, walking away in hesitant little steps. The accountant read the articles his mentally unstable co-worker had mentioned. It was true, it was hard to remain in a jolly mood while reading the headlines, even if the Penguin had been one for joviality.

He thumbed through to the last pages, glancing at the cinema repertoire and the obituaries.

'Hmm, would you look at this? Guess what, Arnold?'

'Yes?'

'Seem today's the Wayne murder anniversary – there's only two obituaries, very tasteful and unpretentious, one from the company and one from the remaining family members. No article. I suppose they do not wish to draw any more attention to the tragedy then already has been.'

'Poor people', said Arnold and shuddered. 'It was c-completely unexpected. H-how many years since now?'

'Five years today. Seems a lot more recent, doesn't it?'

'Oh, yes. A lot h-has happened since, though, you have to admit.'

'Not much of it good, neither for the city nor for us', said Oswald grimly. He referred to the decline of both the rapidly uncontrolled city and the Wesker gang.

'Oi!' came the high-pitched shout of the secretary from the corridor. 'If you two kooks wanna work overtime until tomorrow, that's fine with me, but I'm closing the place up now.'

'Yes, we are done. We will come along in a moment. Please be patient', snapped Oswald. He glanced at his watch. It was a quarter to seven. In a matter of mere hours, the fate of the Wesker gang would be determined.

If Goode and his men accepted a share of their territory and portion of last month's profitable gains, Albie Wesker stood a chance of keeping a position within the underground. He still had connections, even if he lacked the best hired muscle these days; Goode would be wise to accept a truce of sorts.  
In order to maintain trust, both parties had promised to leave their weapons outside the meeting space, a fact that Mr Scarface continuingly lamented.

Oswald folded the papers beneath his arm, hoping for a chance to finally finishing his reading at home. The faces of the late Mr and Mrs Wayne - millionaires, public benefactors, murder victims – stared impassively back at him.

'You know, I do not think you are right about one matter', Oswald told Arnold as they left the building.

'Which m-matter would that be, Oswald?'

'I look at the Wayne obituary and I think – those people had a child, one that will feel their loss in who knows what way, despite all his inheritance.'

'Oh, yes, that is true', nodded Arnold. 'A death in the family affects young children in unpredictable ways.'

The two stood in silence, Oswald contemplating his late father, whose face he barely remembered and whose protection he wished had been there.

Arnold thought of his father and brothers, whose faces he clearly remembered, especially the bleeding mouths and expressions of horror. Mr Scarface firmly told him not to dwell on the past, with so much business on hand tonight.

'So tell me', said Oswald finally, 'If there's some good in everything, what _possible good_ could ever arise from their deaths? Hmm?'

'I really don't know', said Arnold, shaking his head.

They passed beneath the monorail arch, their footsteps echoing and startling a few nesting bats.

Oswald shook them away with his umbrella and stepped into a puddle of muddy water.

'Urgh. I hate suburbs', he snarled.


End file.
